The next and last industrial revolution?

摘要

When a new technology arrives its first market is often as an upgrade to an existing product: iPods are like Walkmen without tapes and early CAD systems were like drawing boards without paper. The same as you already have, only better. However, a really transforming technology goes beyond simple replacement and can eventually render their original "purpose" a niche application. For example, iPods are so changing the nature of music ownership and retail that physical media like CDs are fast becoming redundant. The same trend is observable with CAD systems as they developed from 2D to 3D and then enabled a plethora of layered manufacturing systems that could, in the foreseeable future, render their original purpose (the creation of engineering drawings) a historical curiosity. Will a similar cycle of replacement and transformation eventually undermine the original purpose of rapid prototyping (RP) technologies? It is interesting to speculate how this might happen.